'Daredevil' Season 2 and how Netflix's superhero diversity will continue

The second season of 'Daredevil' will premiere on the streaming service later this year. While the leads for Marvel movies haven't reflected wide diversity yet, those for the Marvel TV series on Netflix do.

Netflix doesn’t usually release viewership numbers, so we don’t know how popular “Daredevil was in its first season, but the show was fairly well received by critics. “Daredevil” was born out of a partnership between Netflix and Marvel Entertainment. Marvel is, of course, currently dominating the multiplex with its many box office hits about superheroes like Iron Man and Captain America.

“Daredevil” was the streaming service’s first show based in the Marvel universe. Since the first season aired, another Marvel show, “Jessica Jones,” premiered. Another two, titled “Luke Cage” and “Iron Fist,” are planned before all the heroes meet up in a miniseries.

Netflix’s slate of superhero shows much wider diversity than the blockbuster films. While just one of the members of the Marvel box office-topping Avengers superhero team is the female Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), fans have questioned why she hasn’t gotten her own movie. A Marvel movie with a female protagonist has not yet been released, though a female incarnation of the character Captain Marvel is set to premiere in 2019.

The Captain Marvel movie was slightly delayed to make room for a movie that will include the female character the Wasp (Evangeline Lilly), though judging from the title, the Wasp will share the spotlight with the superhero Ant-Man in the 2018 movie “Ant-Man and the Wasp.”

Meanwhile, the character of Luke Cage appears in “Jessica Jones” and is played by African-American actor Mike Colter. The series "Luke Cage" could premiere sometime this year (it was shooting at the end of 2015). While African-American actors Anthony Mackie and Don Cheadle have appeared in Marvel movies as the superheroes the Falcon and War Machine, respectively, the characters have been sidekicks so far. African-American actor Chadwick Boseman is set to star in his own movie as the superhero Black Panther, but that won’t arrive until 2018.

In the meantime, Jessica Jones and Luke Cage are taking center stage in their own series on Netflix.